Tuesday, July 23, 2019

New players, new team

Minnesota State's men's hockey roster for 2019-20 has been posted, and it includes jersey numbers for the new players.

The seven incoming rookies are:

1-Jaxson Stauber, G
8-Nathan Smith, F
12-Colby Bukes, D
14-Ryan Sandelin, F
21-Lucas Sowder, F
27-Tony Malinowski, D
28-Cade Borchardt, F

The Mavericks graduated just three seniors from last year's team, one who played regularly in forward Max Coatta. The others were Ryan Schwalbe and Alec Vanko, who played both forward and defense over their time at MSU.

Also missing from last year's roster are goaltender Mathias Israelsson, who signed a pro contract in Sweden despite having a year of eligibility left, and defensemen Michael Bigelbach and Zak Galambos, both of whom saw limited playing time in their time at MSU. Bigelbach played in seven games as a freshmen but none over the last two years. Galambos appeared in four games last season, his first year of college hockey.

That still leaves a very competitive lineup for next season. Speculation in July about who's going to play where seems like a fool's errand.

The Mavericks will have: seven seniors -- Tuomie, Gerard, Scheid, Michaelis, Rivera, Hookenson and French; eight juniors -- Mackey, McNeely, Jaremko, Spooner, Lutz, Duehr, Gerads and Zmolek; and seven sophomores -- Carroll, Aamodt, McMahan, Napravnik, Van Os-Shaw, McKay and Berger.

Broken down by position, there are: 17 forwards -- Tuomie, Gerard, Michaelis, Rivera, French, Jaremko, Spooner, Lutz, Gerads, Duehr, McMahan, Napravnik, Van Os-Shaw, Smith, Sandelin, Sowder and Borchardt; nine defensemen -- Scheid, Hookenson, Zmolek, Mackey, McNeely, Aamodt, Carroll, Bukes and Malinowski; three goaltenders -- McKay, Berger and Stauber.